by Nick Lowry

To know something you must do it one thousand times,
To “really” know something you must do it ten thousand times
And to completely realize something you must do it one hundred thousand times.
–Traditional budo proverb

As we train and practice seemingly endless repetitions of budo techniques day after day after year after year, as we pour our lives into the container of our chosen art, we inevitably find our actions and our lives being shaped and honed and turned toward an edge that transcends all that we know.
This edge is the product of the repetitive practice called renshu, and it is somewhat disconnected from “knowing,” for mere “knowing” does not even really touch what this process is aiming at—namely, mastery with the whole body and mind.

In our Western educational paradigm, it is easy to get confused here. To mistake knowing for “really knowing,” or worse yet for “complete realization,” and to do so is to stop tragically short and stay stuck in mere mental budo, to become a creature of theory and projection.

Renshu will have none of that—it is the spirit behind the famous old saying “Shut up and Train!” and at its heart is the Zen activity of shaping one’s life through action. Like the sword saint Tesshu’s famous Seigan practices— in which participants vow to train for one thousand consecutive days and have one hundred matches per day. A grueling but efficient pace, for most of us the process is more gentle, we take decades , but either way, hundreds of thousands of repetitions are required. Sweat and blood are owed. The ox must be trained. It is the non-negotiable price of admission to realization.

Renshu demonstrates that knowing with the mind and knowing with the body are two very different activities that have each their own rates of realization. To know something in the sense of understanding its basic shape and form is one thing, to know its logic and purpose, its riai, another (and there always seems to be more riai the deeper you push, the longer it goes). But to realize the essence of an activity, to embody it fully, is altogether another matter. In full realization, the self falls away, understanding falls away, and the energy of the activity itself moves through you without conscious design, without even trying—it gets a little spooky. Here, the mind , the sense of self, is along for the ride here but is only a passenger on the bus. The driver is the principle, the activity itself—the doing. Its as if you are imbued with the spirit of the thing, you become the thing. Not two. Most intimate.

When its over, the self, the mind and its mental wizardry return and it is time to reflect. This is the other turn of training; called keiko, to reflect on things past, which gives us the basis of understanding and ultimately, transmission. In keiko, riai emerges in self evident ways, your sensei’s teaching words ring in your ears, but now you hear them differently—you are caught in the net of learning the whys and the wherefores and here again there is no substitute for deepening, for burnishing our budo knowledge in this way.

Keiko unrolls the matter, reveals the secrets, for renshu alone, though it makes for radical efficiency, is not enough. It is not enough to mindlessly, selflessly, do these actions; we must know why. For budo to flourish and thrive, both internally and externally, waza must be fleshed out with knowledge and principle, or they risk becoming meaningless iteration, mistaken, misapplied, misappropriated; the proverbial hammer that looks for world of nails comes to mind.

Many of us want to jump straight to keiko and bypass the grueling renshu, but the results of such shortcuts tend to be dead and limp expressions of budo. Do not be satisfied with dead words—only live words will transmit the real dharma (the truth). It is in the spirit forging activity of renshu that we make a container, a home for real keiko to take place—and this home is built from our bones and sinews, our muscles, blood and sweat. Real Keiko is knowing and reflection with the whole body not to be confused with dry book learning or learning by rote. Only with both sides of training does the full effect take place and make way for the thunderbolt of insight and the brilliance of Bu.

TL;DR: According to an eyewitness account from a Hosokawa clan retainer, Musashi knocked Sasaki Kojirō unconscious during their duel on Ganryū-jima, and Musashi's disciples finished him off.

Selon l’historien Karl Friday, « Les liens entre le maître et ses vassaux étaient contractuels, basés sur l’intérêt mutuel et des avantages, et étaient lourdement conditionnés par les exigence de l’intérêt personnel. Les guerriers médiévaux n’étaient loyaux envers leurs seigneurs que dans la mesure où cela leur bénéficiait. Ils pouvaient, et c’était fréquent, changer d’allégeance quand la situation le demandait. En fait, dans l’histoire du Japon, il y a très peu de batailles où la défection – souvent en plein milieu de l’action – de l’un ou de plusieurs des principaux guerriers n’a pas été un facteur. »

« Notre conception occidentale de ‘l’honneur’ n’avait pas grande signification pour les samouraïs dans la conduite de leurs batailles. Les samouraïs étaient avant tout des réalistes. Au cours des guerres, ils rompaient volontiers des traités, piégeaient leurs opposants, attaquaient au milieu de la nuit et utilisaient toutes les ruses qui pouvaient leur donner l’avantage. (…) Il n’y avait rien d’honorable à leurs tactiques guerrières, en tous cas dans notre définition du terme. » (Charles Sharam, « The Samurai: Myth Versus Reality »).

« La vérité est que les expressions de loyauté désintéressée brillaient par leur absence. » (Karl Friday)

Le bushido (ou « voie du guerrier ») de Nitobe mêle fantaisies virilistes sur les samouraïs de l’ancien Japon, citations bibliques et austérité de la morale protestante quaker, établit un code d’honneur rigide et interdit la désobéissance et la reddition. Même s’il réprouve la cruauté gratuite, le cocktail se révélera une assise idéologique parfaitement adaptée à la machine de guerre militariste, ultra-nationaliste et expansionniste souhaitée par l’empereur Meiji.

By Karl F. Friday

Bushidó ou baratin ? Le point de vue d'un historien médiéval sur l'armée impériale et la tradition des guerriers japonais

Cet article a été publié dans The History Teacher, Volume 27, Numéro 3, Mai 1994, pages 339-349. Copyright © 1994 The History Teacher.

Le terme "bushidó" est très ambigu et couvre un très large éventail de concepts ; aucune des idées modernes ou du début de l'ère moderne sur la "voie du guerrier" n'avait quoi que ce soit à voir avec le comportement authentique des samouraïs à l'époque où ils combattaient réellement ; et les idées modernes sur le bushidó et la tradition des samouraïs n'étaient même pas en phase avec celles des bureaucrates du début de l'ère moderne qui ont tenté pour la première fois d'énoncer un code de conduite pour les samouraïs - longtemps après que ces derniers eurent cessé d'être des guerriers.

Notre véritable objectif est de partager avec vous tout ce que nous avons appris depuis le début de notre aventure au Japon et depuis que nous vendons, créons et concevons du matériel d’arts martiaux.

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